Training After Trauma
4 cards · about a minute
Find the edge
Work out the distance at which your dog notices the frightening thing but can still eat and still hear you, everything useful happens there, not past it.
Slower than feels sensible
Move that edge in by one step a week: a single session that goes over threshold can undo a month, because fear learns faster than confidence does.
Never flood
Holding a terrified dog near what frightens them does not prove it is safe. It proves that you will not help, which is the more expensive lesson.
Pay the noticing
Reward your dog for looking at the trigger and turning back to you rather than for ignoring it; you are teaching a decision, not an absence.